Dean and Bean Crank-In 2023

I am coming to you from what I hope to be the tail end of a horrible mental health episode. I am fortunate to have supportive friends and family and access to care, so I’m doing a lot better. However, I’m still disappointed that I didn’t see the signs sooner. So, as I often say, I hope you can learn from my mistakes. Check in with and take care of yourself before you have to dig yourself out of a deeper hole, like I did.

While all this was going down, I was scheduled to attend the second year of the Dean and Bean CSM Crank-In. Because I was so down (so down I didn’t craft hardly at all, in fact), and because I struggled pretty hard with it last year, I almost didn’t go. At the last minute, though, I figured at the very least I could spend some time out of my apartment with my mom and my aunt.

When I sat down in front of that machine, though, it was the first activity that didn’t require an exhausting amount of effort to perform in weeks. I made a pair of socks in a few hours. I made very few mistakes, and the ones I did make I suddenly knew how to fix, like magic. Crafting was fun again.

That’s not to say that the issue completely went away last weekend (I still needed therapy, a meds adjustment, and an attempt to mend fences), but I had something I wanted to do again, and that made doing all the hard stuff a lot easier.

On a more fun note, since I was able to bust out socks so much quicker now, I made my first shorty pair with a heel tab (the first pair of many more. They were so fun to make) and these adorable pumpkins!!

Thanks for reading, and again, take care of yourself. I’m doing my best to do the same!